


don't even recognize the stranger

by spock



Category: Cowboy Bebop
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Amnesia, Domestic, Dubious Consent Due To Identity Issues, Everybody Lives, Guilt, Identity Porn, M/M, Post-Canon, Yuletide Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-16
Updated: 2014-12-16
Packaged: 2018-03-01 19:25:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,510
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2784878
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spock/pseuds/spock
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jet keeps all the stories and memories to himself. Spike has enough shit on his plate without being held up to the not-so-golden standard of who he used to be, and he doesn't need to spend all his time trying to remember things that won't do shit for him anyway.</p>
            </blockquote>





	don't even recognize the stranger

**Author's Note:**

  * For [dreamlittleyo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dreamlittleyo/gifts).



It isn't that Jet doesn't feel guilty, because he does. It's hard, getting what he wants, having it dropped right into his lap and knowing that the right thing to do is reject it. It's harder because he's done that a few times before — or had it done to him — and knowing that it's the best course of action does nothing to get rid of the bitter taste in his mouth or make him feel any less lonely on the nights where he can't sleep.

He's had so many things taken away from him that it feels like he's due to have something good happen for once. Besides, nothing lasts forever, so why shouldn’t he be allowed to enjoy what he has for as long as it’s actually his?

Despite everything, Jet's managed to live way longer than he ever thought he would being the type of person that he is, with the kinds of jobs that he's had. All he wants to do now is ride this out until the eventual heartbreak kicks in and it all comes crashing down.

So that's exactly what he does.

 

* * *

 

It takes a while for Spike to wake up. When he does, it's like his brain is working independently of itself, only able to control one thing at a time. Sometimes he doesn't open his eyes, but his fingers move around, twitching against the grasp he has on the sheets. Other times he stares around the room, taking everything in, but unable to hear when Jet or any of the doctors speak to him.

It's unnerving. Spike's always been silent — the love they have to peace and quiet, their appreciation for the way it can spread out and take over a room, that’s something they’ve always had in common, even with their different backgrounds; there’s something inside them that never feels the need to fill it up. This silence, though, it's different: menacing and heavy.

 

* * *

 

"Worryin' like that sure doesn't help that face of yours," Spike mumbles.

Jet hadn't even realized that Spike was awake. He looks at him, sees that Spike's squinting his way with that awkward crease he gets between his eyebrows that means he knows something weird is going on but doesn't want to seem like an idiot for asking about what he doesn't know.

"My face always looks like this when I'm around you," Jet bitches. Each word is a battle choked up though his throat, which suddenly feels too tight and dry; the universe of his insides is trying its best to suck all the things he wants to say back into him, his own personal hard vacuum, just like space.

Spike smirks and falls back asleep, cutting their conversation short before it ever really has a chance to get started.

 

* * *

 

 _Amnesia_ , the doctors tell him. Don't know how long it'll last. _These things are always hard to gauge. There’s no real way to know how much of his memory he’ll regain._ Just gotta ride it out until it reaches its inevitable conclusion: some, all, none.

 

* * *

 

Jet doesn't know how good an interplanetary fishing trawler is for convalescence, but the Bebop is their home, and it's all he has to bring Spike back to, once the doctors decide that there's nothing left for them to do.

 _Don't you remember anything?_ The question sits on the tip of Jet's tongue, always half a second from slipping through his lips. It runs through his mind incessantly, the worst kind of nag, vicious and hurt and scared; all the things that Jet is feeling. If he were the confiding type, the only person he'd feel comfortable talking about it with would be Spike, but Spike's not here right now. Not really.

There's other things he wants to say too, like, _here's where you lost your goddamn mind on some space 'shrooms_ , or _that's the spot where you always leave your fucking shoes, and even though I know that's where they're gonna be, I nearly kill myself trippin' over them every fucking day anyway_.

He keeps all the stories and memories to himself. Spike has enough shit on his plate without being held up to the not-so-golden standard of who he used to be, and he doesn't need to spend all his time trying to remember things that won't do shit for him anyway.

So he keeps his mouth shut as he reintroduces Spike to the bridge, doesn't mention anything about all the hours of their lives they've wasted watching Big Shot, keeps that he's cooking bell peppers and beef for dinner a secret as he shows Spike the kitchen before finally dropping Spike off at the workshop so that he can keep himself busy while Jet cooks.

 

* * *

 

Spike's different, but still the same. More and more, Jet finds himself liking Spike this way, and then feels guilty for it.

He decides that maybe everyone would be better of without their memories; at fifty everyone should have their mind wiped clean, get a second shot. Spike's well below that cut-off, but he's lived through enough shit — too much shit — that he deserves the break. At a certain point, the past does nothing but weigh you down.

Jet's spent a good amount of time learning how to read Spike's face out of necessity, because of the job they do and because of the way they live inside each other's pockets. It's important to know when you're about to hit a no-fly zone with somebody you've got your whole life wrapped up around.

Now it feels like what was once a survival tactic has turned into a cheat code.

Spike doesn't bother to hide his feelings much nowadays, but when he does, Jet can see right through him, down to the things that Spike probably doesn't even know about.

Jet knows Spike better than Spike knows himself, now. It's a big responsibly.

 

* * *

 

Some things never do change, though.

Jet makes them bell peppers with beef for dinner, with actual beef, for once. He sits on the stairs, smoking and watching Spike shovel away at his plate, bitching Jet out between each bite.

"Just don't quit your day job, 's all I'm sayin'," Spike's mouth is stuffed full, tiny grains of rice falling down onto his lap as he speaks.

"Thing is," Jet says, smoke coming out of his mouth in a lazy cloud. "You say that, but I don't see you settin' down that fork." Spike's eyes focus on the table; Jet can tell he's trying to decide if giving Jet shit is worth giving up on the rest of the plate.

Jet likes that this _whateveritis_ that's always between them is just that, some instinctual need that makes Spike give him shit just so Jet can brush it off. They've always worked well, that way. Reincarnation isn't his thing, but Jet likes the idea of them keeping this dance up, over and over, until the universe finally blinks out.

Spike does put his plate down, eventually, after he's scraped it clean. He rises up from the couch in one of his fluid motions, going from sitting to standing to stretching all at once, hands locked above his head, palms facing the ceiling.

Jet's stamping out his cigarette when Spike walks up to him, pressing their lips together like it's nothing. When they pull apart, Spike's got that look on his face, the one that Jet know's means he's flying blind, had made a bet that he isn't entirely sure will work out, trusting his gut and hoping like hell it doesn't come back to bite him.

He realizes what it must look like to an outsider, which Spike is now, Jet figures. Jet's taking care of him, the two of them working like a well oiled machine, even with Spike running on instinct and not memory. So there they are, two guys, shacked up in space, closer than coworkers by any measurement. Spike's smart, he's noticed that nobody else has come around to check up on him, must've figured out that it's because there's nobody out there for him, besides Jet. It's obvious that Jet's all alone too.

Jet knows that there's a look he get sometimes, this way he can't help but look at Spike, no matter how hard he tries. Spike must have gotten used to it, _before_ ; Jet's under no illusions that Spike wasn't able to read Jet just as well as Jet read him. At a certain point, you learn how to tune things out, and this Spike doesn't know how to do that, has no idea that he even should.

Jet tips his head forward, making it so they're kissing again.

 

* * *

 

Spike probably thinks that they've kissed a million times. That when he kisses Jet the next morning, it's their one-millionth and third kiss. That when they kiss a few months down the line, after cashing in on their first bounty since Spike's accident, it's their one-millionth and seventy-first.

It's not.

But it's not their first kiss either.

When Spike kisses him that night, it's officially their seventh.

**Author's Note:**

> (thank you to karanguni for the beta!) happy yuletide!


End file.
